Henry Chipembere

Henry Chipembere was a native leader and political organizer during the struggle for the indeendence of Malawi, which was earlier known as the British colony of Nyasaland. In March 1957 Chipembere, then a young radical graduate newly elected to the Legislative Assembly, wrote to Dr. Hastings Banda in the US, urging him to return home to take over the leadership of the Nyasaland African Congress, NAC, which was in disarray. After several years of struggle, during which Chipembere was imprisioned by the British, he and his family were forced to flee to Tanzania upon the accession to power of Hastings Banda after independence in 1964, when Banda assumed dictatorial powers. The family lived for a time in Dar es Salaam, before moving to Southern California in the USA.